Berkeley, CA and California as a whole is supposed to be the mecca for the Disability Rights Movement/Independent Living Movement we in the San Francisco Bay Area enjoy curb cuts, the Ed Roberts building and The FAIR Education Act that requires that California K-12 schools provide Fair, Accurate, Inclusive and Respectful representations of people with disabilities and people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender in history and social studies curriculum etc..

However California police departments from LA to Berkeley have a long history of not following the Americans with Disabilities Act especially offering public accommodation when police approach people with disabilities with harsh physical abuse like Berkeley police officers did on Kayla Moore causing her death although the Berkeley police department knew Kayla’s mental health disability.

The Moore's family moved to Berkeley because they wanted to be a part of this disability mecca with not only accessible city but services like in home support services that gave Kayla independence in her own home with a team including family members, friends and caretakers who accepted Kayla as a transgender woman with a mental health disability and providing access in her home and in the Bay Area community.

Although the Americans with Disabilities Act, ADA, was passed into law back in 1990, many activists have tried to use the ADA under title III, Public Accommodations saying that police provide “a public service” so because of that their “services” should be accessible and accommodating to people with disabilities. This legal concept has been successfully argued in another San Francisco Bay case of police brutality against a person with mental health disability, TERESA SHEEHAN, Plaintiff-Appellant,v. CITY AND COUNTY OF SAN FRANCISCO and through a successful appeal in 2014 that said “the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to police encounters with mentally ill suspects” finally agreed what disability activists were saying for a long time. I also think that the Sheehan case also gave some disability education to some police brutality lawyers on disability in general and the ADA when it comes to police.

Not only in California that people with disabilities and their families are suing police saying that police didn’t provide public accommodations to their disabled love ones who many have died from police shooting, police physical attacks and in police custody.

For example, Kayla’s family, supporters and lawyer, the same lawyer in the Sheehan case, said what Berkeley police did to Kayla like kneeling on her back and forcing Kayla in a WRAP device caused her to stop breathing goes against public accommodation thus the Americans with Disabilities Act. This same claim of police discriminating toward people with disabilities has been shouted for years by disabled advocates in Chicago but now the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois on Wednesday October 5th/2017 continued the push the Chicago Police Department by filing a lawsuit claiming it mistreats people with disabilities in black and Latino communities.

Although using the Americans with Disabilities Act might be new in the area of police work for certain lawyers, judges and police, activists with and without disabilities have push for this reality for a long long time.

The 2004 successful appeal of Teresa Sheehan and we, the family, activists hope that Kayla Moore’s November 2017 ADA case against the city of Berkeley will result to the city where the Moore’s family were looking for in the early 80’s, a place that is open, safe and uphold the legacy of disability activism that made Berkeley a leading city for people with disabilities!

For more einnformation about Kayla’s case go to

Show up this Oct. & Nov. to support the Moore family as they finally have been granted their days in court, after over four years of seeking a fraction of accountability from the City of Berkeley and BPD.